Hitler, the Dalai Lama, sin and salvation; and the religion of North Korea

Published: 28 November 2009(GMT+10)

Canadian correspondent Samroon R. asked us about the actions of Hitler compared
to the Dalai Lama, and the role of conscience:

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Dear Brother in Christ, my question to you is that we all have fallen nature. All
of us are born sinners. Hitler was born a sinner and so is Dalai Lama. What my dilemma
is, when we all have a sinful nature, why some people are able to commit more sinful
behavior than others? Did Hitler have a defiled conscience and Dalai Lama doesn’t—that
is why Hitler committed such hideous crimes and Dalai Lama is still preaching and
following great moral values. His moral stands on issues such like abortion and
homosexuality exactly matches that of a Christian. What is your judgement in order
to resolve this issue? Is there any psychological issue with people who commit moral
crimes and they cannot control themselves, or is there a spiritual issue such as
demon possession! Do our circumstances play a part in shaping our thinking and how
does our conscience become defiled? I would be grateful if you address this issue—do
recommend some material for study on this issue. Thanks and God bless you and your
ministry.

The fallen nature of man ensures that all of us will sin at many points in our life,
both by doing things we should not do, and by failing to do things that we should
do. We can also sin in our thoughts; for instance, by harboring hatred, lust, or
blasphemy in our minds. This ensures that even the ‘best’ fallen person
will still fall far short of God’s standard of perfect righteousness. Even
‘good’ pagans like the Dalai Lama who promote social issues that Christians
may agree with are thus condemned by their own thoughts and actions.

Not everyone is as completely depraved as they might be

The inconsistency you point out in the behavior of fallen people like the Dalai
Lama and other fallen people like Hitler arises because not everyone is as completely
depraved as they might be. However, every person is depraved in every part of their
life. One person might sin some time by getting angry and saying something hurtful
to his brother. Someone else might sin by getting angry and killing his brother.
Anger and murder belong to the same ‘category’ of sin (Matthew 5:21–22), but the person who said something
hurtful to his brother did not sin to the same extent as the person who killed his
brother.

Sometimes there may be psychological reasons involved in a person’s sin (one
thinks of sociopaths who are completely unable to empathize with others). Or with
the propensity to a certain category of sin being more frequent in their lives than
others—even genetic factors may predispose a person to one type of sin. But
predisposition does not make that particular sin inevitable, nor does it change
our individual responsibility for it. I would not exclude demon possession as a
possibility either. But such things are the exception, rather than the rule. The
problem isn’t that we’re sick and need counseling, the problem is that
we’re sinful and need a Savior. While other religions can claim people who
have experienced genuine change in their lives, only Christ can mend the broken
relationship between God and humanity that our sin caused.

The official religion of North Korea is atheism, like all Communist states of the
past and present, many of which end/ended up with the people venerating (voluntary
and forced) the “great father” of the country (Stalin and Mao, for example).

In the west we see people venerating pop stars (Michael Jackson), movie stars, sports
stars, even sometimes seeing political leaders (Barack Obama) as Messiah-like and
‘worshiping’ them.

In Japan, where Shintoism and Zen Buddhism have no place for a Creator-God, the
emperor became an object of worship.

When you remove worship of the Creator-God from a culture, you don’t end up
with rationalism but superstition, as American Skeptics found to their surprise.
They found that in regions of the USA where strong, Bible-believing Christianity
was weakest, superstition was strongest—see
Superstition vs Christianity. This suggests that the more the "New atheists"
succeed in their aims of eradicating Christianity, the more superstitious people
will become.

In the west we see people venerating pop stars (Michael Jackson), movie stars, sports
stars, even sometimes seeing political leaders (Barack Obama) as Messiah-like and
"worshiping" them. People don’t cease to be religious when you get rid of
the true God; they just transfer their sense of worship to something else that is
not worthy of worship.

The Bible speaks of this phenomenon in Romans 1:18–25 (note the last verse):

For the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness
of men, who by their unrighteousness suppress the truth.
For what can be known about God is plain to them, because God has shown it to them.
For his invisible attributes, namely, his eternal power and divine nature, have
been clearly perceived, ever since the creation of the world, in the things that
have been made. So they are without excuse.
For although they knew God, they did not honor him as God or give thanks to him,
but they became futile in their thinking, and their foolish hearts were darkened.
Claiming to be wise, they became fools, and exchanged the glory of the immortal
God for images resembling mortal man and birds and animals and creeping things.
Therefore God gave them up in the lusts of their hearts to impurity, to the dishonoring
of their bodies among themselves, because they exchanged the truth about God for
a lie and worshiped and served the creature rather than the Creator, who is blessed
forever! (ESV)

Yours sincerely,

Don Batten

Comments

W.J., Australia, 22 Sept., 2010

A good article. On the atheism and emperor worship. In regards to atheism, the communists probally have a similar respect/veneration for their leaders as many atheists actually have for Darwin. This comes from them always in fact choosing to take the thought of Darwin above all else. They make his world view king of their mind.